(3) Evil is not overcome by denunciation. It is surprising how much efficacy is supposed to go with denunciation. Keal, constructive, aggressive good is of far greater significance than eloquent invective ; such invective has its place, but it must be accompanied by active practical effort, or it effects little more than summer lightning.
^ Carlyle, in his review of Elliott, the Corn-Law Ehymer, has a most instructive passage. " We could truly wish to see such a mind as his engaged rather in considering what, in his own sphere, could be done, than what, in his own or other spheres, ought to be destroyed; rather in producing or preserving the True, than in mangling and slashing asunder the False." But denunciatory rhetoric is so much easier and cheaper than good works, and proves a popular temptation. Yet it is far better to light the candle than to curse the darkness.^
1 W. S. Kelynack, in The Young Man, March 1911. » -^7. l. Watkinson.
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Literature.
Jowett (B.), College Sermons, ii. 168.
Oosterzee (J. J. van), Year of Salvation, i. 107.
Potter (H. C), Sermons of the City, 190.
Sauter (B.), Hie Sunday Epistles, 79.
Scott (M.), Harmony of the Collects, Epistles, and Gospels, 1.
Streatfeild (G. S.), in Sermons for the People, New Ser., i. 23.
Christian World Pulpit, xiii. 131 (Beecher) ; liii. 36 (Gore) • Ixx. 372
(Muir). Church Pulpit Year Boole, v. (1908) 162. Churchman's Pulpit, i. (Pt. 47), 280 (Hedge), 282 (Brent).
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Owe no man anything, save to love one another. — Rom. xiH. 8.
1. Theke are several things in the verse from which the text is taken that are very characteristic of St. Paul. First, there is the tendency to go off upon a word ; the mention of the word " love " seems to suggest to the Apostle's mind his favourite thesis, " Love is the fulfilling of the law." This he pursues through several verses. Again, he uses the word " owe " in two different ways : in the familiar signification of owing money, and also in the sense of duty or obligation. As if he said, " Owe no man anything but that debt which you must always owe and ought to be always paying, the endless debt of love." Thirdly, there is the tendency which we often observe in the writings of St. Paul to merge the particular in the general, the moral in the spiritual. He is constantly going back to the first principles of the love of God and of man.
2. St. Paul has spoken of the duties and the spirit befitting members of the body of Christ in their association with one another in the intercourse of private life. He now comes by a natural transition to speak of their attitude to the community at large, and especially to the authorities, whether of the city or of the empire, under whom they found themselves. That they were Christians was an additional reason why they should be good citizens. The State, like the family or the Church, is of Divine origin and appointment, with claims not to be set aside, demanding in some form the service, the support, the loyalty of all who belong to it. The persuasion that each individual has a duty to the State, must hear its call and give it his support, is not at liberty to uphold merely what is pleasing to himself, to pay or not to pay according to his own whim and fancy, leads to the
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further persuasion that each has a duty to each and all around. " For this cause pay ye tribute also : for they are God's ministers, attending continually upon this very thing. Eender to all their dues : tribute to whom tribute ; custom to whom custom ; fear to whom fear ; honour to whom honour. Owe no man anything, save to love one another : for he that loveth his neighbour hath fulfilled the law." It is a principle of universal application. It covers the vast field of mutual human obligation.
3. How Christians should behave in their relations to one another and to the world around now becomes the burden of the Apostle's counsel. Each man in the station in which he is placed is to exercise the gifts with which he has been endowed. And each man is bound to consider the rights of others. No man can live his life without learning that he cannot follow his own inclinations to the uttermost without coming into contact and conflict with inclinations different from his own. He must in some respects yield to others, or others must yield to him. He has to do with kindred, or friends, or strangers, with the sympathetic or the antagonistic, with superiors, inferiors, or equals ; and the manner in which he conducts himself towards them has much to do both with the development of his own character and with the public weal.
St. Paul says, " Owe no man anything." Let there be no man who has against thee a legitimate claim which thou hast not fulfilled. The subject is Debt. Beginning with that part of it which relates to money, let us proceed to moral debts, and end with the debt of Love.
I.
Money Debts.
First, in its most prosaically simple form, " Owe no man anything " means, Have no money duties which thou canst not pay. This is a homely and excellent rule which carries us a long way in daily life. Debt is to be avoided. All money claims are to be honestly and scrupulously met. And this is nearly always possible, as we shall see if we look into the most common causes of " running into debt."